


Survivors

by waterbird



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-15
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-11-01 05:43:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10915506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waterbird/pseuds/waterbird
Summary: Harry dreams, and the survivors fall.





	Survivors

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2010, this was supposed to be a drabble for hd100's 'dream' prompt, but it got too big. Cross-posted to 100quills for the 'image' prompt.

All summer long, Harry dreams, and the survivors fall. First is Hermione, swallowed by a Hagrid-sized Monster Book of Monsters. Then Ron, pinned by the sword of Gryffindor beneath a frozen, impenetrable pool of Butterbeer. Another time, Ginny chases after him, crumbling into brittle broomstraw as she runs.

Luna, Neville, George, McGonnagal ... everyone enters the stage of Harry's dreams once to die a single, spectacularly absurd death. Everyone except Malfoy.

Malfoy is there night after night, slipping from Harry's grasp and tumbling into the Sorting Hat, which offers to free him only if Harry will sing the Hogwarts school song in Parseltongue. Madam Malkin scolds him when he says he can no longer speak it and stitches the Hat closed with spider silk and a needle made of Basilisk fang before dropping it into Dumbledore's pensieve.

On such nights, Harry ignores the Dreamless Sleep at his bedside and lies in the darkness, fingers clenched painfully around the ghost of Malfoy's hand. He knows that Malfoy, like the others, is safe, yet the dream persists.

One night, as he uncurls his aching fingers, Harry sees for the first time something cruel and unacceptable about the emptiness of his palm. And he realizes that safety is the last thing he wants for Malfoy. Because if Malfoy doesn't need saving, how else will Harry ever get to touch him again?


End file.
